Dell forums say that it is an IDE aka PATA aka ATA drive just like you said... and 120 gigs are fine... they also say that i can have the tech guy Clone the OS and all programs on this drive and have the image installed on the new drive making it plug and play... that is, IF its salvageable, which it might not be from the noise its making... the computer we had built before my dad died, runs SATA and RAID componets, but thats kinda redundant..

pretty simple fix and not too pricey for a decent laptop...